IDK, Brent. I couldn't see it happening in a million years, but Ronnie's style would be very interesting with Stryper. The stuff from On Fire! and Beyond Belief has a certain energy to it that could flow well with Stryper. He really shined on some of Petra's heavier tracks from that era, most notably Midnight Oil from Wake Up Call. Like I said, I don't see it happening by a long shot... but I think it would work. Dare to dream! (Wonder if Greg Baily would... never mind! Not opening that can of worms LoL)

You don't think all of the pastors in pulpits believe the stuff they say do ya? Of course, there are LOTS of musicians in secular bands who don't believe everything they sing. They don't come up with their demonic album art. It's an act for a show. There are lots of artists singing Christian lyrics who don't believe them. There are some Gaither type artists like this even.

From what I've read, this situation turned pretty ugly. Please join me in praying for Tim and his wife, the band, and all involved. Hopefully the love of Jesus will prevail in this matter and bring peace,

Wow. Sad situation. As far as Michael owning an expensive home, assuming he does, the guy has worked for it. He's a brilliant songwriter and musician. He's put out several solo albums, done projects with other people, played with Boston, etc. It doesn't hurt to have the income from Stryper, but he's not living on the street without it. As for Oz and Robert, they make their own choices, and build their own lives. Cost of living wherever they are, the choices they've made over the years; all that factors in to what their life is now. In time hopefully Tim will shed the anger and think a little deeper on this.
It sounds like he doesn't have a whole lot of faith right now. I thought he was studying to be a pastor at one point. He acts like the subject of Christians and divorce is completely foreign to him.
The guys have the right to boot him from the band if they see that his attitude has gone south. I don't see a problem with that. As far as the divorce, if he's going all Amy Grant style on his second wife, which is wrong from the Bible's perspective, than they wouldn't be out of line to use that as additional reasoning for ousting him.
Tim brings up that the other guys in the band have gotten divorced or have married divorced people. I don't know all the details of those situations to compare them to what scripture says, so I can't say whether he has a valid point or not.

I won't speculate about their circumstances or conflict since I don't know them personally and don't know anything other than what I've seen on the Internet. I will say he'd be wiser not to deal with this publicly. If God couldn't use people who have gone through divorces or have had relationship issues there would be a lot of people in trouble. And if that article was actually quoting him word for word (with a name like blabbermouth, I sort of wonder about that) he needs his mouth washed out with soap.

Not really. He was actually not happy about the fact that they would have to find a new bass player, he has made solo records and Stryper even toured without him for a short period. So he is very important but he is not Stryper.

That still does not change the fact that if he started touring with three other guys, people would start to wonder whether this was Stryper or not. The other guys sure had their influence on the sound and feel, and though Michael Sweet writes most of the songs historically he did not write all and he did not write all of them alone.

I agree that Oz and especially Robert influence the sound. It's not the same though. I think Brent was getting at the fact that Michael owns the Stryper entity, and the other guys essentially work for him.

I don't know the business part of it. We can assume, since Mike HAS decided to work with other bass players in the past, he has replaced his own brother on drums for an album, because "Robert was not prepared", and has threatened them all....It's pretty safe to say Mike runs the show. Why does he run the show? Mike is the focal point, the voice. Without Mike, there is no voice of Stryper.

The rest of the guys can be swapped out and it's still going to work because Mike is there. The other guys can't go out as Stryper while Mike is doing side projects or touring solo. Therefore, he controls their ability to make income. So, either way, Mike has them all in his hands.

Wouldn't be the first time someone was booted from a band for letting their personal life get in the way of their career. Perhaps the most high-profile example was Steve Perry who was fired from Journey when he delayed their comeback tour while contemplating whether or not he wanted to get hip-replacement surgery.

Just for interesting perspective. I did the math and found that Michael wrote 84% of the songs on all Stryper albums. It's actually probably slightly higher because I did not eliminate songs that were borrowed from other groups, like Shining Star and Peace of Mind. On the songs that had co-writers, there was mostly only one other writer. There were a few with outside writers, but mostly it was either Robert or Oz. I didn't tally them up, but Robert might have more credits than Oz.